DEVFJDPMENT OF Till- T1:XT-P>()()K OF AGRICUIJURI: IN 



NORTH a.\if:rica« 



By L. H. Bailey, 



Director of the Cullcye of Aijr'trnUnrc mid AijrlculluraL Experiment Station of Cornell 



UniveritHij. 



A century and u lialf '\^o tlie ancients were still dominant author- 

 ities in aj^riculturc. The first j^reat application of scientific teaching 

 to agriculture, at least in English, was TulTs Horse-IIoeing Hus- 

 bandry, 1733, in which an attempt was made to improve tillage by 

 expounding what were conceived to be its underlying principles and 

 results. The scientific spirit of inquiry' grew slowly and steadilj^; but 

 it was not until the birth of the science of agricultural chemistry in 

 the early 3'ears of the eighteenth century that great progress was made 

 in applying science to farming. Davy, Liebig, and Boussingault, 

 representing three nationalities, are the prominent names in this early 

 field. The principles of chemistry as applied to farming were con- 

 ceived to be fundamental concepts of a rational agriculture. They 

 afforded a central idea around which all other agricultural questions 



could be crystallized. The long-hoped-for science of agriculture had 

 come. 



In the ultiFiiate anah'sis of the text-books of agriculture one finds 

 two contrasting and conflicting t^'pes of ideas — the idea of science 

 and the idea of l)usiness or practice. Those who conceive science to 

 be the fundamental and controlling idea in farming start the Ijook 

 with discussions of groundwork of science — chemistr3', plant life, 

 physics, meteorology. Most of the older books and many of the 

 newer ones are of this t3'pe. Those who conceive business or prac- 

 tice to be the unit in agriculture start the book with farm manage- 

 ment as explained and aided by science. The former s^'stem is applied 

 science and it usuiilly starts with heat, air, elements, chemical action, 

 or physiology; the latter system is scientific explanation and advice 

 and starts with soils, plants, or animals. One emjihasizes the stand- 

 point of the studiMit, the other the standpoint of the farmer. One 

 begins in the laboratory, the other in the field. The applied-science 



« An article under this title I contributed to Book Reviews, 7 (1899), No. 2, pp. 4.3-53. 

 The present paper is based <>ii that article, but is greatly extended. 



S. Doc. 148, .58-2 44 689 



